Got a Rat/Mice Problem...

I started collecting wood in November and this is the first sign of mice. I found him in front of my garage. The Fiancee freaked and said that the first sign of them in the house (i.e. the indoor cat goes nuts at night), the wood is gone...and thus the possibility of a stove.

Here is my woodpile near the house (is it too close?):

I guess on the positive side of things, the rat poison granules I put down underneath my wood racks is doing it's job....but I'm worried as I plan to collect twice this amount of wood and put one more row of wood closer to to the house before stacking it in the backyard. Is the answer just to keep the woodpiles populated with granules?

I am actually moving my entire stack right now to prevent this. The stack slowly encroached towards the house and I did see a few mice, so now it'll be about 50' away at least. One interesting thing I found while moving old underwood is there must have been a bunch of snakes living under there in the summer time because I found all kinds of small animal bones near what appear to be snake holes.

I had a cat adopt us earlier this year. He was on his last leg when he strolled up the drive way.
He sleeps on an outside porch when he wants to. He might be gone all day and come home for dinner and a fresh drink.He loves to patrol the stacks.
I have seen far less mice this year then any year before.

Yer gonna have mice with almost ANY woodstack, that's for sure. And for me, the feral cats seem to do a pretty good job of patrolling the pile. I'm not a big fan of those feral cats, mainly because of a tom that keeps.spraying the one end of my stack. But you gotta consider the good (mouse control), so I guess I'll have to deal with him for now.....

Im sorry Bster13 but I truly believe your woodplies and the appearance of a mouse is pure coincidence. Mice dont eat wood. They are attracted to food sources and heat. I live on a farm. There is No association between woodpiles and mice. More likely they are attracted to bird seed or bags of cat food stored in your garage.
Its probably folklore that mice try to make their way inside of your home to survive an anticipated cold winter. Like the amount of fuzz on wooly bear catipillars.
Check to see if you have food stuff they are going after. Really, the stacked wood provides safe shelter from cats but woodpiles dont equal mice infestations.
Of course, snakes and squirrels are a different story. ;-)

Feral cats don't do as much as most would think for rodent control. About 3 years ago in the mornings when I wood tie my work boots on the front steps, as I bent over I started getting a whiff of cat urine quite frequently. I set up some specialized traps and to date have caught 87. I never wood have guessed I had that many local ferals.
I've had little success with the pellet type poison. The mice tend to drag these pellets off and store them in a cache where they may get wet and dissintegrate or worm,grubs or other animals may eat it .
The Tomcat blocks I've found to work the best. You can nail/wire them down forcing the mice to chew off small bite and injest. I usually put a few at the bottom of the stack in the wood shed when i refill it in the spring.http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_s...s=tomcat poison&sprefix=tomcat poison,aps,339
A well fed pet cat/dog won't injest a poisoned mouse unless it's a flat out glutton.

Im sorry Bster13 but I truly believe your woodplies and the appearance of a mouse is pure coincidence. Mice dont eat wood. They are attracted to food sources and heat. I live on a farm. There is No association between woodpiles and mice. More likely they are attracted to bird seed or bags of cat food stored in your garage.
Its probably folklore that mice try to make their way inside of your home to survive an anticipated cold winter. Like the amount of fuzz on wooly bear catipillars.
Check to see if you have food stuff they are going after. Really, the stacked wood provides safe shelter from cats but woodpiles dont equal mice infestations.
Of course, snakes and squirrels are a different story. ;-)

- The wood piles may give a home to the mice, but I don't think they are increasing the population.
- The poison did it's job this time around, and if I never put out the poison I would of never see the mouse in the first place.

I guess we'll see what happens over time as I double my wood pile (want to get two years ahead). The wood pile I'm going to put in the fenced back yard will have no poison (dog goes in the backyard) so perhaps it will be a good test to see if the mice start a knocking then.

I had a cat adopt us earlier this year. He was on his last leg when he strolled up the drive way.

Click to expand...

I've seen 3 legged cats hopping around, but never a one legged cat. Must be quite a sight!

I'd rather have mice running around outside than feral cats. Wouldn't want either in the house, but just because the mice are outside doesn't mean they will end up in the house. Just make sure your house is sealed up tight and don't leave the door open. Even if you get rid of your wood stacks that won't eliminate all the mice in the neighborhood or the possibility that they can get in the house.